Xiang Chun at The Schoolhouse

As must be clear from earlier posts, a big part of the sustainability program here at The Schoolhouse is to use as much home-grown food as possible. Now it’s time to write something about Xiang Chun, the first edible plant to be harvested this spring here at The Schoolhouse. Xiang Chun is called Chinese Toon in English, with the official name of Toona Sinensis, or Cedrela Sinensis. Whatever the name is, it is a species of Toona trees native to eastern Asia, especially China. It is a deciduous (drops leafs seasonally) tree growing up to 25 meters high with a trunk up to 70cm diameter. The young leafs of this tree are extensively used as a vegetable in China, in fact it is one of the most popular vegetables here. However, as popular as it is here, it is not used in culinary purposes in other parts of the world. This species is really cold-tolerant and beautiful, though, at is grown in various parts of the World, even in northern Europe – indeed, it is used as a street tree in the boulevards of Paris. Anyway, we are interested in it for culinary reasons and we are going to use it in all of our three restaurants, as we have many Xiang Chun trees in our properties:

-The Xiang Chun of Roadhouse (1kg/year)
-Jim’s Xiang Chuns (2) (8kg/year) (pictured above and below)
-The Xiang Chuns of Piviteau’s House (2) (15kg/year)
-The Xiang Chuns of The Pavilion’s Gate (2) (15kg/year)

So, as can be seen above, we have seven trees of Chinese Toon around the village with the estimated total yield of almost 40kg/year. I am, however, a little sceptical whether the amount will be this large in kilos – they are leafs, after all – but the point is that there will be rather lot of this Chinese delicacy for us to use.

The leafs of this “vegetable tree” have a kind of onion-like flavour, and apparently smells a bit like fried onion flakes. It can be used in many ways and is really popular in northern Chinese cuisine. Just for your information, the young read leafs are considered better than young green leafs, so if you are not going to use all the leafs, pick the red ones. The fresh young leaves and shoots of this plant contain 84% water, 9.8% protein, Vitamin C, Vitamin A, Vitamin B1 and B2, and are rich in aromatic substances. So, from the health point of view, Xiang Chun is an ideal dietary vegetable with natural antioxidants – which is good news bearing in mind that a part of sustainable foods is to serve healthy food at the restaurant. Xiang Chun leafs are uniquely aromatic and therefore excellent for stir fry (especially with egg), salad, fry, pickling, seasoning, etc. Popular Chinese dishes where Xiang Chun plays a major role include for example Stewed Tofu with Xiang Chun, Fried Fish with Xiang Chun, and Xiang Chun Omelet. There is also healthy aromatic tea made out of it. Xiang Chun grows fruits as well, but those are mostly used as a medicine.

Today and yesterday, we have been planning with Randhir, our executive chef, how to use Xiang Chun, how this delicacy could best add value to our restaurants. We are going to use Xiang Chun in all of our three restaurants - The Schoolhouse, Roadhouse and Xiaolumian. We decided that about 70% of the leafs are used in The Schoolhouse restaurant, 20% in Roadhouse and 10% in Xiaolumian. At this point, there are basically six things we are going to do with Xiang Chun:

-Deep fried Xiang Chun, served as complimentary appetizers in The Schoolhouse
-Xiang Chun to top up The Schoolhouse Salad
-Pickled Xian Chun, used with the Working Man Noodles, with Rice Congee (breakfast) etc. in The Schoolhouse – many possible uses
-Xiang Chun omelet, served as a special in Roadhouse (traditional Chinese delicacy)
-Sweet bean paste in Xiaolumian – Xiang Chun an important ingredient - served with noodles
-Xiang Chun tea, served in all restaurants - season's special (we'll try first to see whether it's worth serving...)

Xiang Chun should be all used fresh (or pickled, obviously), as it is not good dried or freezed. It is still to be planned how the actual harvest works in practice during May – we probably won’t be taking all the leafs at the same time, but for example one-two trees per week. We are going to keep track how much of Xiang Chun we get this spring in reality, and document all the information for coming years. It will help the manu planning in future.

Next month we are going to serve our own fresh Xiang Chun in our restaurants, feel free to come and have a try!

Stay tuned for new posts.

Our own fruit and nut trees

As mentioned earlier, achieving sustainability in food production is much about being local and growing own food when possible. In addition to the Roadhouse Garden (see previous post), we have quite a lot of own fruit and nut trees in the company’s properties. Most of them are in the courtyards of our rental houses, in the yards of our restaurants and in the gardens of the company owners’ house. Some trees can also be found from our chefs house as well as the house of the owners of The Pavilion, one of our rental houses. Yesterday I found out also that there is also three Xiang Chun trees in the courtyard of the house where me and Michelle live. We even tried some Xiang Chun yesterday – it was weird, but ok.

Anyway, after planning the garden, the next step for me in the project was to make an inventory of what we have – how many trees, what kind of, where – and estimate the yields and harvest times. We’ve always known that we have own fruits and nuts and we have even used them in the restaurant, but no one had formalized it, no one had consistently check what we have and wrote it down. After all, the first step in this project should be to find out what we actually have to begin with. So my task was to, in a way, make it official and formal. I also named the trees according to where they are, to make the inventory more detailed. I am not going to make here a complete list of each tree we have, but a list of how many trees we have of each species:

Sugar Pear: 11 trees, estimated 33kg a year
Persimmon: 15 trees, estimated 279kg a year
Chinese Tates: 5 trees, estimated 14kg a year
Chestnuts: approximately 62 trees, estimated 125kg a year
Walnuts: 3 trees, estimated 60kg a year
Mulberries: 1 tree, estimated 10kg a year
Hongguo: 6 trees, estimated 14kg a year
Plums: 1 tree, estimated 3kg a year
Xiang Chun: 10 trees, estimated 40kg a year
Green Apple: 2 trees, estimated 7kg a year
Wild Peach: 2 trees, estimated 3kg a year
Wild Flower Pepper: 1 tree, estimated 5kg a year
Apricots: 2 trees, not giving fruits this year

As it appears, we have quite a lot fruits and nuts available for use, as well as Xiang Chun, which is a kind of eatable leaf, especially popular in northern China. The biggest yields will be of Persimmon and Chestnuts, as can be seen from the list above. It is going to be fun to figure out what to do with hundreds of kilos of Persimmon! Persimmon could be seen in way as a trade mark fruit of The Schoolhouse, as we have a lot of it and even one of our rental houses is called The Persimmon Court. The Persimmon we have is a species called The Japanese Persimmon, native to China. These are sweet, slightly tangy fruits with a soft to occasionally fibrous texture. The Japanese Persimmon is the most common kind of Persimmon in the world. Many of you probably wonder what is Hongguo - it is Chinese hawthorn which is a tart, bright red, and resemble small crabapple fruit. They are used rather lot in culinary purposes, for example different kinds of Chinese snacks and jam. There are also drinks made out of it. Hongguo is good for medical purposes as well, as it is know as an aid to lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol, and treat some heart related diseases. We probably won’t be making any medicine out, though, as this program is about sustainable food. Chinese hawthorn is related to Pihlaja, which grows also in Finland.

So, now we now what we have, but that’s not enough, is it? The main task is to plan and formalize what to do with all the fruits and nuts and how to incorporate it to menu planning and other business activities. To do that, firstly you have to know when different trees are about ready to be harvested. For this I got much appreciated help from Li Haixin, many thanks to him.

Estimated harvest times in time order:

Xiang Chun: May
Apricots: June-July
Mulberries: July-August
Plums: August
Wild Peach: August
Wild Peppers: August
Walnuts: September
Chestnuts: End of September
Sugar Pears: October
Apples: October
Hongguo: October
Chinese Tates: End of October
Persimmon: November

During the spring and summer, we are going to plan with our chef Randhir how to use all this fruits and nuts as efficiently as possible. The idea is to get the whole yield used, in one way or another. Obviously, we don’t grow everything we serve, but we most definitely want to serve everything we grow. Some part will be used fresh in the restaurant, some part will be made juice, jam, pickle etc. Some will be served in the restaurants, some will be sold to customers to take away. First thing to be planned is how to use Xiang Chun, as it is the first to be harvested, in May. Rest will follow. Then we are going to document the plans, so they can be used in the following years as well. This way we could have a kind of program how to best use our own food resources.

I will keep you updated on this subject! I will also make a picture post to show pictures of our trees.

Pietari

The Roadhouse Spring Garden

A part of the sustainable foods program in The Schoolhouse is to grow own food as much as possible and use own ingredients in the restaurants. What could be more local that doing it yourself? This spring we are undertaking a project called The Roadhouse Spring Garden, which is basically the starting point of the sustainable foods program. The Roadhouse is one of the three restaurants this company has and it has a rather big garden well suitable for this kind project of growing own food. The garden plan has already been made, here it is:

So the garden will have three different kind of lettuce, rucola, cucumber, eggplant, spring onion, squash, two different kind of parsley, pink raddish, dill, rosemary, thyme, basil, oregano, cilanteo, spinach, beans and strawberries. So far, we have already planted spring onion and pink raddish, tomorrow we are supposed to implement the first plantings of lettuce and herbs. The idea is that not all the lettuce and rucola is planted simultaneously, but once in every two weeks or so. This way we can have a (almost) continuous supply of fresh lettuce - it really can't be preserved. So the fist planting should take place tomorrow, and then we'll have a few more planting times in every second week. Herbs on the other hand can be planted all at once, as they can easily be preserved by freezing or drying. Still, we are not going to plant them all the same time, because we first want to make sure they survive. Once the first ones start to successfully grow, we'll plant the rest of them. The actual gardening is done by an experienced local farmer Li Fengquan, who is the father of Li Haixin with whom I'm working on this project. It is great to have an experienced farmer with us, otherwise the chances of success would be rather small.

The first part of the project was to make a document of what seeds we have, when should they be planted and how. I found out different qualities they have in order to decide where to situate each species in the garden (e.g how much sun they need, what they look like, how tall they grow). That was actually fun, as it was really new to me - I haven't got any experience what so ever in gardening. Once this was done, we went to the site and made the plot plan. Here is the garden at the time we made the plan (only spring onien planted):

We decided that each plot should be devided by bamboo sticks and strings, and then a label should be put to each pot indicatating what is growing there, both in english and chinese, for customers to see. As mentioned earlier, we want to make the own food production/sustainable food a part of our product and market it to people. Here is the picture of the garden with bamboo stick on it (strings coming later):

We should have the first harvest in early summer, then we are going to serve homegrown vegetables and herbs in our restaurants! How great is that! We are planning with our executive chef Randhir how to use all the stuff we grow - what part used fresh, what dried, what freezed etc. - and how to put in on menu and deliver the information to customers. We should be starting the planning rather soon. But first we have to get the garden growing! Well, that's it for today about the garden. I am going to keep photo track of it, and I will keep you updated. Hopefully everything goes well and the plants survive!

Thanks for your interest!

Pietari

What is sustainable food?

In order to create a sustainable food program, it is naturally essential to first understand what actually is meant by sustainable food and what are it’s basic aspects. Sustainability in general is about seeking ways of providing food, water and energy that are long-lasting and have less of an impact on the environment. Sustainability in food therefore becomes an issue for anything from food production and transportation to its disposal. It is not just one project, but a long lasting way of doing things. There is no legal definition, but basically sustainable food should be produced, processed and traded in ways that it

- contributes to thriving local economies and sustainable livelihoods
- avoids damaging natural resources and contributing to climate change
- protects the diversity of both plants and animals
- provides social benefits, such as good quality food, safe and healthy products, and educational opportunities

Sustainable food should be produced close to home to a greatest possible extent, so that it is fresh and seasonal and also supports local economies. In addition, when food is produced locally, the need for transportation and energy use in food production is minimal, and thus pollution and contributing to climate change is minimised. Being as local as possible makes also good business sense, as consumers are more and more aware of environmental issues and wants to buy locally produced sustainable food, to feel better. So, when restaurant uses locally produced food, that’s arguably socially, ecologically and economically sustainable – it supports local economies, minimises negative impacts on the environment, and gets competitive advantage in business. However, being local isn’t the only aspect of sustainable food, although it’s probably the most important. According to a website dedicated to sustainability in food, the seven principles of sustainable food – which I found rather good and true - are:

1. Use local, seasonally available ingredients, to minimise energy used in food production.
2. Specify food from farming systems that minimise harm to the environment such as certified organic produce.
3. Limit food of animal origin served, as livestock farming is one of the most significant contributors to the climate change.
4. Exclude fish species identified as most “at risk” by The Marine Conservation Society. The Marine Conservation Society has a list of the fishes that should be avoided in order to achieve sustainability, and a list of fishes ok to serve.
Avoid list: http://www.fishonline.org/advice/avoid/
Eat list: http://www.fishonline.org/advice/eat/.
5. Choose Fair Trade certified products for imported food and drinks.
6. Avoid bottled water and instead serve filtered tap water in reusable jugs or bottles.
7. Promote health and wellbeing by cooking with generous portions of vegetables, fruits and starchy staples like wholegrains, cutting down on salt, fats and oils, and cutting out artificial additives.

In addition, one shouldn’t forget the importance of waste management as a part of sustainable food program. A significant part of the waste in the world comes from food production, and it is crucial to try to minimise the waste the company produces. Ways to do this include for example recycling, using recycled products, composting and cutting down the amount of excess packaging, as well as simply cut down food waste.

Soon I will write here where The Schoolhouse currently is when it comes to the principles above.

There are many reasons for a restaurant to have a sustainable food program, in addition to the fact that it is a right thing to do given the current condition of our world. First of all, various surveys show that that is what customers increasingly want today, people want to feel good about themselves and are really paying attention to these things. Being able to tell customers an engaging story about where your ingredients come from can give you a competitive advantage, helping you to attract new customers to your business, and keep them coming back. Incorporating local and seasonal produce into your menu, perhaps in the form of daily or weekly specials, or seasonal variations to standard menu items, can liven up your menu and keep your customers coming back for more. Also, buying food locally, or growing yourself, means fresher and better quality product. You can also develop closer relationship with local producers which eventually can mean better and more reliable service.

So here is a little something about what is sustainable food. Of course, it is not as simple in reality, but you have to simplify it a bit in order to get the process started. Keep it simple.

Sustainable Food Project

Hello from Mutianyu village, Great Wall, China!


The Schoolhouse At Mutianyu (in both pictures) is a tourism company situated at Mutianyu village right next to the Great Wall of China. The company is created by China Bound Ltd. and consists of three restaurants, nine (soon to be ten) rental houses and a glass studio. Two inns are also under construction. I am a tourism student and I'm currently doing my internship here, with great pleasure. The business philosophy of The Schoolhouse is sustainable tourism. Yes, it is a trendy word nowadays, but here sustainability is more than a buzzword, which makes it great to work here. Here they use existing buildings, hire and train local people and support other village businesses, source ingredients locally and make food totally homemade from scratch. The management takes into concideration the ecological, economical as well as social aspects of sustainability. The main building, The Schoolhouse, is built into an abandoned elementary school and most of the rental houses are built into old run-down peasant houses. The company really puts effort to achieve sustainable tourism, keeping in mind the main principles of good business behaviour – respecting people, operating legally and ethically, and providing customers with pleasant experiences. To The Schoolhouse a big part of sustainability is social. They are interested in development that preserves the sense of the vernacular community and its history. They believe that small-scale development provides better opportunities for rural neighbors than large-scale projects, which tend to displace people and make them strangers in their own land. For more information about the company, visit www.theschoolhouseatmutianyu.com

The Schoolhouse has already been awarded three Green Stars from Eco Hotels of the World, which is a comprehensive independent guide to the greenest hotels and lodges on the planet. This tells something about the work here. For more information about this rating, visit http://www.ecohotelsoftheworld.com/the-schoolhouse-rental-homes-4.html. The work is never done and we here are always trying to get better and more sustainable, and this year we are undertaking a project to create a Sustainable Food Program, which is my major assignment during the internship, in addition to operational assistance. This blog is about the process of getting there. The project is still at the very beginning, but the goal is that in a while the restaurants of The Schoolhouse will be as sustainable as possible when it comes to food production, waste management etc. Obviously, sustainable foods will be a part of our marketing and our product, something of a competitive advantage - that is one part of the project as well.

If you are interested in this project and sustainability in tourism as a whole, follow this blog and we’ll keep you updated how things are going.

Pietari Sajaniemi, an intern at The Schoolhouse at Mutianyu.